Goals vs. Vision: David Wood and Vic Strizhouse on Building Something People Follow

You have set a goal, hit it, and felt the strange letdown that follows instead of the satisfaction you expected. Vic Strizhouse opens the fourth session of this series on exactly that gap, the difference between a goal and a vision, and why chasing the first one without the second leaves people successful on paper and hollow everywhere else.

A goal, in his framing, is a milestone. A vision is the thing underneath it that makes the milestone worth reaching in the first place, and he brings David Wood on as a guest specifically because building Empower Network required exactly that kind of vision, cast publicly, long before there was a company behind it.

What is the actual difference between setting a goal and casting a vision?

Vic points to corporate vision statements as an unlikely but useful reference: Microsoft imagining a computer in every household, Nike aiming to inspire every athlete in the world, Amazon wanting to be the place people go to find and discover anything. None of those are goals with a date attached. They are a picture of a future state, and Vic argues that people do not actually buy into your goals. They buy into your vision, because a goal is something you hit and move past, while a vision is something they can see themselves living inside of.

David Wood picks up the thread with his own account of building that skill, describing how he would drive through the wealthiest neighborhoods in his city while he and his wife were living in a one-bedroom apartment, not to torture himself but to deliberately keep the picture of what was possible in front of him. Dissatisfaction with where you are right now, he argues, is often the honest starting point for a vision, not a flaw to fix before you begin.

Why does saying your vision out loud change something that stays quiet in your head?

This is the part of the conversation that goes furthest past typical goal-setting advice. David describes turning his computer and phone off for months after realizing his existing business model was not actually helping people reach their own goals, walking for long stretches while wrestling with a single question: how can I help people do this.

Society is like this thing where it’s like you’re always under water, all you can think about is Friday and then you get to Friday, you look at your paycheck, you’re discouraged and you go and you pay your bills, there’s barely anything left and all you can think about is going to work and then coming home and you barely have time for your family and it’s like you’re running on this treadmill.

Getting free of that treadmill, he says, was never really about the money itself. It was about a mind no longer consumed by the next paycheck, free enough to notice what it actually wanted to build. And once he had that clarity, the mechanism he leaned on was talking about it constantly, in every phone call, on every early webinar, before there was any proof it would work.

How do you actually turn a private dream into something other people will help you build?

Vic distills what he calls “vision is the art of seeing what is invisible to others” into three concrete moves rather than a mindset platitude.

• Identify a vision compelling enough that it inspires you before you ever try to inspire anyone else with it.
• Share it in terms of we and us, not I, since people will follow a shared future far more readily than they follow your personal ambition.
• Make it real by connecting daily actions back to that same picture, so the vision has somewhere concrete to land.

David’s own version of the third step was blunt and specific: he asked himself whether his dream was big enough to fit the dreams of the people who might join him, a question he says he heard originally from an old mentor and has repeated ever since. If your vision cannot hold the people you want to lead, they will eventually leave to go build their own.

What should you actually write down before the next session?

Neither Vic nor David treat this as an abstract exercise. The instruction underneath the whole conversation is to get specific about what you actually want, separate from any dollar figure attached to it, and to start speaking it out loud to real people before you feel ready. The clarity, both men argue, comes from the repetition of saying it, not from waiting until it is already clear.

The full session goes much further than what is captured here, including David’s account of the years he spent building belief before any of this paid off. Watch it in full, free, when you Create your free account.

The full session transcript follows below.

Transcript

Folks, obviously the income examples discussed are extraordinary. The income claims presented are not intended to serve as a guarantee of income. Instead, they're designed to give you an idea of what's possible. Success in this business requires leadership, hard work, and dedication.

Since we want to help you make an informed decision, we've gone above and beyond with our income disclosure document. If you want to see the average earnings, please visit the page at www.empowernetwork.com forward slash income dot php. All right, everybody. Good morning, good evening, good afternoon for you guys.

Hope you guys are doing awesome today as always. Man, this is fourth, lesson number four. Welcome, you guys. I am pumped to see you all here tonight.

Hopefully, you guys can see me okay. This is just, give me like two more seconds here. I just wanted to make sure that we are live. If somebody can text me or Skype me or something, let me know that we are live.

That would be great. All right, we're just going to go ahead and get started, guys. Welcome back. All right, so this is the biggest month ever, part four of six.

We are in the second half now of the training on how to engineer your biggest month, right? How I was able to engineer my biggest month in the, I think it's like in the history of network marketing. I don't personally know if that's accurate or not. According to David Wood, that is accurate, and heck, you know, I'll take it.

How does that stuff happen, right? So hopefully, if you have been watching, you know, parts one, two, and three up to this point, right, we have been laying a good foundation. You know, we have been laying, you know, talking about a lot of the stuff that really, on the surface, you know, it doesn't seem like, you know, it has to do anything with marketing. But on a deeper psychological level, right, it's got everything to do with marketing and everything to do with how you are, you know, how successful you're going to be in business, how successful you're going to be in building your, you know, your downline, how successful you're going to be in just, you know, just operating your business and running your business.

And by the way, I see some of you guys are saying that we are live and everything is cool. Okay, awesome. You know, this, what I'm going to talk with you guys about tonight, and I, this perhaps could probably be, you know, one of the shorter lessons. But without this particular ingredient in your business, okay, without your vision, everything else is going to be, it's not going to, you know, yeah, you might make a few bugs here and there.

But if you really, really want to create this glue-like, synergy and energy and just this aura around yourself and your business, because this is, this is what it's all about. You know, it's, it's about you creating. I want you guys to hear me out here, okay? Because some of this stuff is going to be, you know, you need to, you will need to really pay attention to get this.

And I really hope you listen. You know, I really hope that you not only listen, but I really hope that you actually hear what I will tell you. And don't just hear the ideas, but actually act on the ideas. All right?

And do something with it. You know, one thing that I learned over the years is that when we just listen to something, right, when I just listen to something, it can come in this ear, get out from the other ear, right? But when we act on ideas, you know, that's when things happen. And so one of the, for me anyways, from my experience, one of the things that played a very important part in, you know, in my, in my success, I guess, as an online marketer, as a builder, as a leader, is my ability to create and instill and kind of share and inspire other people with my vision, okay?

And so I've decided to include this, you know, in the training is because I think if you guys get this, building your business is going to be very easy, okay? Give me one sec. I will see if I can do a little trick here for you. Cool, cool, cool.

And we actually might have a guest joining us a little bit later on as well that I wanted to interview him as well to give you guys a little bit of a different perspective because none of this stuff is just me teaching you from theory, folks, okay? Everything I want to share with you is my experience and how I was able to do, you know, what I was able to do. Hold on one sec here. I want to show you guys some visuals here real quick because I think it's going to be, it will be easier for you to kind of grasp, right?

Grasp the, you know, if you're taking notes to really grasp the idea. I'm a visual guy. I'm not sure about you. So it might be beneficial, okay?

Let's just kind of dive into it. Check this out. See, goals enable you to achieve objectives, right? A vision helps you realize your dreams.

Okay. So, let's get started. So, let's get started. So, let's get started.

So, let's get started. So, let's get started. So, let's get started. So, let's get started.

So, let's get started. So, let's get started. So, let's get started. So, let's get started.

As a builder, okay, and guys, we are going to just move forward here. I don't want to really review any of the stuff that we've covered so far. You know, if you, this is the first time you're joining us or, you know, if you're not watching these videos in order, I actually highly recommend you go back and you start from video one and watch these, okay? Traffic is important.

Convergence is important. We're going to cover that. You will never have to worry about traffic ever. You will never be struggling with not knowing how to convert people.

but that stuff is is is not as important long-term for you okay because one traffic idea can work today you know might not work two years from now whatever Google changes their stuff for you know there's a new new thing that comes out your your your your vision is something that's gonna propel you something is gonna just kinda carry you over through through ups and downs to different changes and everything and this is how you'll be able to a whole people together you know how what was able to you know why not started with empower network guys I'm just over a year ago alright and as of today we got over 28 thousand people I join their team bank and I and and and created the most duper replicable a duplicatable team I'm to my knowledge how how is it possible because I did not start building this team I did not start you know I did not start to build my you know my business I'm I did not start to promote you know on power networks products I or or you know or just promote what I'm promoting just for you know the the the with an idea of hitting a specific goal right and I started with empower network and I started to promote you know the products have empowered network I'm because I bought into the vision overpower network you see goals are important we're gonna talk about that but up with kind of how to your 12 new products was really going to help you realize your dreams just keep that in mind here's the units that I want to these real quick as never a jumping I'm and just gonna have a yeah a conversation I just have a conversation with you guys and just be kinda you know hanging out with your tonight and and just talk about something's This is just my perspective, what's working for me really, really, really well and hopefully it's going to work for you as well.

It goes back to the basics. If you have a strong enough why, you will always find the how, we all know that. People don't buy into your goals. This is important.

This is important my friends. I realized this in 2010, 2011 when I really started to kind of craft the aura. As a marketer, here's something to think about. So as a marketer, as you go about building your business, as you're going about selling whatever it is that you're selling in Power Network products, whatever you're doing out there on the internet and this obviously, this training can be applied to anything you're doing out there.

Think about one thing. Your job is to create an aura, a certain energy around yourself if you will. Think about it. If you can create that certain aura around yourself, that energy as a marketer that just speaks inspiration and vision, that inspires others with your personal vision.

People don't buy into that. They don't buy into your goals. We have goals and then we have vision and I really want to talk about this tonight in a lot more detail. The difference in how to really engineer your vision, how to create your vision, how to become a visionary which is believe it or not, very, very easy process but a lot of people don't consciously, deliberately think about it.

A lot of people don't deliberately take certain actions in order to become a visionary. There is actually a way to do it and everybody listening to my voice tonight, guys, every one of you can do that. That's the beautiful part. Check this out.

Vision is the art. I don't remember who said this. This is not this last part. I heard somebody said it and I don't remember who but basically they said vision is the art of seeing what is invisible to others.

In this particular business that you and I are in, network marketing, multi-level marketing, affiliate marketing. Whatever it is that we're doing out there, heck, we can even be building a brick and mortar type business. Whatever industry that you're in, if we can portray, if we can show people, if we can paint a picture to others showing them, letting them see the invisible. If you can clearly see what others cannot see.

If you can portray that and paint that picture for them, man, it's a done deal. A couple of things, I was actually, as I was thinking about this, I'm like, how are some of the bigger, these big corporations and big companies, what are their vision statements? Here's what I found. Microsoft, check this out, their vision statement is, there will be a personal computer in every household running Microsoft software, Microsoft.

There's another one, Nike, to bring inspiration and innovation to every athlete in the world. That's Nike's vision statement. According to them, if you're a human being, you're an athlete. That's according to them.

This is Amazon, check this out. To be the world's most customer-centric company, a place where people can come to find and discover anything they might want to buy online. What would be your, as we progress and as we go, move forward into the training here, I want you to think about what would be your vision statement for your business, for you. Again, we're going to talk about how to actually craft it, but just kind of wanted to plant a seed for you and have you start thinking about it.

People, a lot of times, they associate happiness with them hitting their goals. To me, that is not a place where I want to be because happiness has more to do with where you think you are going instead of where you are right now. That is why obviously setting goals is important and all that good stuff. .

Any time when we base our happiness on hitting a specific goal, a lot of times we're going to be disappointed because you reach it and then what? Your goals are, if you can imagine, two layers. The top layer is your vision, your goals are the milestones along the way. How to become a visionary?

Three very, very simple steps and then we're going to break this down and then I want to interview. I want to talk to Dave about some things that I believe will be really beneficial because he is a big visionary guy as well. Here's step number one. Very, very basic, very easy.

Identify the vision. Again, we're going to talk about how to do that. Basically, you're going to create a compelling vision. Your vision must inspire you before it inspires somebody else.

How to do that? I'm going to show you guys what worked for me personally. Step number two is we're going to share our vision and inspire others with our idea. Step number three is hey, we're going to make it real.

There is no point of talking about your vision if you don't know how to actually make it become reality. We're going to create the vision, we're going to share the vision, and then we're going to make it real for you and for the people, help them achieve the vision that you inspired them with. Everybody's going to have a different vision for themselves, but it's not about you hitting anything. It's not about people achieving and doing what you want them to do.

Everybody's going to have their own vision, but our responsibility is when I'm building my team, I don't know what a lot of people want specifically in their life from this business. But I do know that all humans, we're all the same. It doesn't matter what country you're from, doesn't matter what skin color you are, doesn't matter if you speak English or don't speak English. We essentially are all the same.

So if you strip down all the layers that people put on themselves, I'm from this country, I got this cultural layers and this and this and that, we all want freedom. Right? We all want something. Right?

Right? So there is one thing that's really, really compelling to us all. And if we can discover that, man, it's over. So here are the six steps, guys.

I'm just going to run them through that and then we're going to have a discussion for the rest of this lesson. You might want to take notes on this, okay? I'm a big believer in setting big lofty goals, okay? Big lofty goals.

James Cameron, I don't know if you guys, I've actually been reading about him lately. He is the guy who… He is the guy behind Avatar. I don't know if you guys knew that. James Cameron, awesome dude.

What I've discovered is he talks about, he says, I set just ridiculous, absolute ridiculous goals. When he was working and when he had a vision of creating Avatar, the movie Avatar, nobody believed that what he wanted to do would work. He had a just giant, absolute ridiculous goal. But what most people don't realize is James Cameron, he is not really a goal setter.

He is a visionary, okay? So think about it, Avatar, okay, when they wanted to create Avatar, he put up, he believed in his vision so much. And this is the power of what you do in your business, again, this speaks, there is a direct correlation between James Cameron and what we do in our business. He believed in his vision so much that he put up 200 million, around 200 million dollars of his own money invested into the project.

And then he raised around, somewhere around 900 million dollars, okay? He raised that money to create Avatar, the movie Avatar. And that went on to gross over, I think, 2.8 or close to 3 billion, with a B, 3 billion dollars. By far the most profitable movie that has ever been created, okay?

Now he could not have, no way that he would have raised 900 million dollars if he did not have a vision that was very, very compelling to him in the first place. And then his ability to, you know, to translate and share that vision and inspire others with that vision, okay? So set big, lofty goals. How, you know, here is what I did in the beginning, you know, in, I'll actually come back to that later.

I'll come back to that later. Here is step number two, okay? Again, if you guys are taking notes, I want to talk about this in more detail with you all, just in a conversation. I'm just going to break this down.

I'm just going to put them up here. If you are taking notes, you might want to take, jot them down. Step number two is I want to know what's reaching your goal is going to do for you, okay? Step number three is in doing that, right, you're going to find your true purpose.

Step number four is you're going to embody your purpose, okay? I'm going to talk about what that means in a minute here. And then we're going to crystallize your vision. And then what I do is basically… I just speak vision into existence, okay?

You don't sell products. You speak vision into existence. What I… Is this… Let's see here. Hold on.

Let me see. Let me come back here real quick. Hey, Dave, you joined us. What's up, man?

Can you hear me okay? Are we live, brother? Yeah, yeah. I just want to make sure we don't have an echo.

Sometimes I have an echo on these things with this microphone. So good to see you, Vic. Okay. Yeah, yeah, man.

Good to see you too. Yeah, yeah. You got your, like, pajamas on or something. Yeah, man.

That's exactly what it is. I'm not even wearing any pants right now, man. Believe it or not. No, I'm just kidding.

No, that's actually why I was a little bit late is I showed up naked. Oh, really? Yeah, I had to run back upstairs. But I'm kidding.

I was out helping with the kids. So good to be here with you, brother. I appreciate you. Yeah, yeah.

I appreciate you too, bro. You know, Dave, I asked you to get on here because I honestly just wanted to have a conversation with you. And in doing so… Yeah. …I wanted to share ideas that worked for both of us.

Because I know that you're a big visionary guy to create what you guys created with Empower Network with Dave Sharpe. I mean, you got to be a visionary to be able to do that. Yeah, I've got my perspectives. You definitely have your perspectives on these types of stuff.

Before I share my stuff, how I create my vision, right? Let me ask you this, man. I'm actually curious because I don't know this myself. When you were starting from, you know, you were prospecting and working for other companies and trying to build your business the hard way.

And then something happened and when you had the idea for Empower Network, right? Something switched for you. How do you come up with it? How do you create?

How do you create a compelling vision for where you want to go? I mean, you speak about creating a hundred millionaires a year. And that's obviously a giant, you know, that's a giant goal, that's a big vision. How do you come up to that?

What are some steps that you, some processes that you go through to create your vision, Dave, if you don't mind sharing? Yeah, well, good questions by the way. And by the way, everybody on here, this isn't planned. So you're going to catch just what the real truth is because there's no bullet points or anything that I have for this.

Yeah. I literally just texted you just right before this hangout, like three minutes before. I'm like, hey, can you get off? Yeah, yeah.

I'm actually curious. And I'm going to share, you know, how I do this. And hopefully, and this is the idea, folks, here. Okay, this is, none of this stuff is scripted or planned or anything.

I find that the best nuggets, you know, you will have is from like real conversations. So it's just going to be an open conversation. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, this is, let me share some perspectives on it first and then I'll share kind of what I do, okay?

I have a particular background in being trained in how to have visions and how to make them happen that's based on my religious upbringing first, which, you know, you're Christian. I grew up Mormon and, you know, like was a missionary and come from like kind of like a family that, you know, read the Bible all the time and things like that. Yeah. And so I have like kind of a religious background in how to plan and see the future.

And then I, after that, I joined Amway and Amway was really particular, not the company, but the teams and the organizations. They were really, really, really, I'll put it like this, Dexter Yeager, who probably has the largest organization in direct sales, still alive, you know, he's known as the master dream builder. Because really what our task is, if you look at what I do, which is building organizations, is getting people to do what we're talking about tonight, it's getting people to dream. Because for whatever reason, society kind of puts down dreams, you know, I call it, you know, it's like a crabs in a bucket.

You know, if you put one crab in a bucket, it can climb right out, right? Well, any more than one crab in a bucket, none of them can get out. Because the second one tries to escape, the other ones, no matter how many it is, they put their claws in the crab trying to escape and they drag it back in the bucket. And society kind of does that to people because, you know, our parents weren't able to accomplish their dreams because they were brought up in a system that didn't teach them how to be entrepreneurs or they quit or they gave up or a relative gave up or a society, somebody in society gave up.

And so people generally, by the time they're like in their early 30s, and it's right around then usually. And it's really interesting, Vic, that we just never got there, you know what I mean? I was still dreaming right up until 30 and by the time I was 30, I was rich and, you know, I think that you're turning 30 this next year and, you know, here you are. You know, I know everybody thinks Vic's 45 but no.

You know, anyway, so people generally stop dreaming right around the age of 30 because they get beaten up by corporate America, they get beaten up by their teachers, they get beaten up by their friends, the crabs in the bucket, right? And so our task is really to get people to dream. And so I come from a perspective where I'm crafting my vision in this, is that for me my vision isn't just about what I'm going to accomplish, it's about what my vision is going to do for the people that are a part of it, right? And there's a quote I heard, originally I heard this from Brad Duncan.

Brad Duncan is a founder, at the time, I don't know what he is today, but at the time I was in his organization, he was a founder's crown, I believe, in Amway. And if you know, he was in his early 40s, if you know what a founder's crown is, it's like, you know, you've got to have super powers. He'd do team meetings where he'd have auditoriums filled with people, you know, 15,000 people would go down in a weekend for family reunion, which is a big event he'd put on every year. And one of the things I heard him say, and I'm always repeating this and this is where I got it originally, is I heard him say, I heard him ask a question, he said, you know, ask a question, and he says, is your dream big enough to fit the dreams of your team, right?

And I repeat that all the time. The reason I is, because I've never been able to forget it. Because when I think about how big my vision is, right, and how many people I want to impact and the stages I want to speak on, and the auditoriums I want to fill, that's thinking about my vision. Well somebody else would have to have a really big dream to fit that, right?

Right. Then I've got to think about the Vic Striz houses in my organization, and the Tony Rushes in my organization, the Tracy Walkers in my organization, and I've got to ask the question, am I thinking big enough to fit what they want, what they need, and what they desire inside? And if I'm not, here's the key, for what I'm doing, which is building generational leadership, it's not just being a leader, right? For what I'm doing, if my vision can't fit those people, eventually they're going to go somewhere else, right?

Because if their vision doesn't fit inside of this anymore, and if it can't be a part of it anymore, right, then they're going to, if they're a dreamer, then what do they have to do? They have to do what a dreamer is supposed to do, which is go build their dream, right, to build their vision. And so you've got to come from a couple of perspectives when you're building out a vision for what you're going to accomplish, and that's number one, what's in your heart? What do you really want?

And for me, I've always had these weird desires in my heart, Vic, and I don't know if I created them honestly. I don't know if God put them there. I don't know if I'm just weird. But you know from the time that I was a kid, I always saw myself traveling around the world speaking in stages and auditoriums, not really knowing what it was about.

And then when I was 21, I landed myself in network marketing and I fell in love with this industry where you could build a business by building other people. And I always had a dream of filling auditoriums with people and inspiring them, but my dream was self-centered. And to me, that's what I've always wanted. That's what I've always wanted.

Until my needs were met, and that was in early 2009. And something that happens, and this is kind of a long-winded answer to your question, but something that happens, Vic, and this happened to you at some point, when your needs get met and you've got a good heart and you've really got a heart for people, when you can kind of do what you want to do, and you don't really necessarily have a lot of selfish desires, you have a choice. You can either stay where you're at forever, right? Which is a choice.

You can do that. I think that's kind of a slow form of death, personally, to stay where you're at forever. Because I believe if you're not going forward, you're going backward in life. But you have a choice.

You can learn to dream bigger, or you can stay where you're at, or you can decide to go backwards. Well, for me, I wasn't willing to stay where I was at after I got there. And the reason I wasn't willing to stay where I was at was because I didn't want to go to work. Because my needs were met.

I could do anything I ever wanted to do, because I never had these desires to own fancy cars. I mean, I own a Tahoe right now. It's a nice car because it's safe for my family, my kids. And I live in a nice house now, and the reason I live in this big house is because there's lots of space in it, and big spaces foster creativity.

There's studies into that. And I like just big spaces, and so I've got this big space with a nice view. But I've never really wanted a lot of things, personally. I just haven't.

I've never really cared a lot. And so for me, I had to reach deep down inside, and I had to look out, and I say, well, what am I really doing? Well, I had to be honest about what I was doing, and I felt like if people could not accomplish their dreams, that I was selling thin air. Regardless of whether there was a real product, regardless of whether there was a real service, I felt like if I'm in an environment where somebody can't reach their dreams, even if they work hard.

They just can't do it for whatever reason. Yeah. Not that they don't have the ability, but maybe they don't have the resources right now. Maybe they don't have the years of failure to build off.

Maybe they don't have all day and night to work like I did when I got started, because I didn't have any kids when I got started. You know? I didn't have any kids. I didn't have any responsibilities other than figuring out how to succeed.

You know what I mean? And so, you know, it's to ask the question, it's like, you know, well, what do I really want? And when I thought about it, what I always dreamed of doing was being able to empower and transform people. Transform people through my communication ability, because I believe it's like a gift that I have.

Because even though I practice and even though I work on my communication ability, I have a gift for it, right? And you'll find everybody on here that you're kind of like, you're born with certain abilities where you're stronger in certain areas than other areas. And those abilities that you have, those strengths that you have, a lot of them are unique to you. And if you try to live in my strengths, if you try to live in Vic Strizhaus' strengths, you could learn our skills.

You could learn our strategies. But ultimately, Vic has strengths that I don't have. I have strengths that Vic doesn't have. We can learn from each other, but ultimately, we're engineered to be a little bit of a different way, right?

And so, you know, I looked at my group and I said, you know, if people can't accomplish their dreams, you know, being involved in my team, I'm not interested in doing it. I'd rather be homeless. And that's maybe a weird thing for some of you to hear because that wasn't a selfish desire. It was, I want to help people in my team be able to succeed.

So, my vision began with a question. And the question was, how can I help people to do what I'm doing? And that was a question that led to, for a time, a little bit of discouragement and depression, right? And one of the things that happens and, you know, all of you on here, I don't want you to be frustrated by this ever.

I wasn't really depressed. I never get really depressed because if I find myself feeling bad, I just think of something happy. But I got it. Yeah.

Yeah. You know, because I tried everything. You know, in my business. I'll give you some examples of things that I tried and this all led to the crafting of a vision.

It's a really long answer to a short question. You know, I went out there and I said, okay, maybe people succeed if I coach them. So I'm going to coach people in my team for free because I was building a network marketing organization. So what I said is I said, if you are willing to listen to my advice, I will coach you for one hour a week for free if you are in this package in my company.

Wasn't that expensive? It was like 500 bucks and I earned a hundred dollar commission. Now I was earning like 40,000 a month at the time and everybody else that I knew that was earning 40,000 a month, they were essentially earning it from charging for coaching. Well, I was doing it and just coaching for free because I was building teams and organizations and I figured maybe if I coach people, they'll be able to succeed.

And so I offered free coaching and I was on the phone eight hours a day coaching for about three months straight. But I ran myself ragged, it's a true story. And then after like three months of running myself ragged, I realized that free coaching doesn't really have that much of an impact on people who aren't doing anything. The only people who seem to get benefit from it were the people that didn't want it, the people that would have rather paid for it.

It just didn't seem to benefit people for whatever reason. And so I said okay, so if I coach people for free, that's not going to help them get the results that they want. So I said, what is it that's the problem here and then I made a different decision. I was at the time marketing a marketing system and then I had a network marketing company I was building.

Where I built funnels and essentially I was recruiting two to five people a day, which is where I come up with the message to recruit two people a day, it's what I've always taught for years. And I was recruiting two to five people a day into this thing and it was happening through my phone, organic traffic on Google and search and social media. And I just said you know what, if I'm not going to help people make money, I'm not going to do anything. So I essentially turned my computer off, I turned my phone off and I took a lot of walks for a couple of months.

Well here's what happened over those months for me, right. It put me into a space where I was going to figure out how to do what I really wanted, which was to help empower people to live their dreams, it's always what I've wanted. Or I wasn't going to do anything. I was going to work at Starbucks or something.

I just wasn't willing to sell thin air anymore. So I kind of wandered around the hills and I wandered around the beach and I listened to a lot of classical music. And I started jotted down. I started writing.

I started writing. I started jotted down ideas as they came and kind of nothing came, but I asked a lot of questions, I asked a lot of questions and I asked a lot of questions. And something that I learned, and this is from my religious upbringing, and honestly I don't even know how this works. This could be God, this could be the universe, this could be, you know there's this great video Justin does in the sales video we have up now where he says, I asked the universe, send me a mentor who can show me a better way, right, and he says then I appeared in his life.

And I think that's a true story, but I don't know. But what I know, you know when I was growing up, I grew up Mormon. And the Mormons are always quoting this scripture in the New Testament in James. And I can't remember exactly what it says, but it says something along the lines, if any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God that giveth to all men liberally and upbraideth not and it shall be given him.

Yeah, that's actually exactly it. It's if any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God that give it to all men liberally and upbraideth not and it shall be given him, right. That's the King James in I think like James 1-5 or something. Well.

I don't know how that works. I have found for whatever reason, when I persist in asking a question, and it could be before it was praying and then after a while I just start like asking questions in my head over and over and over and over and over and over again, I just don't let up. What happens is I go through a time of frustration and I go through a time where I'm like reading and I'm learning things and then all of a sudden I have like this inspiration kind of just download into my brain. So what I was doing was I was like looking all over the internet and I was saying, you know, I'm not willing to do what the old schoolers do.

I don't want to fly around and do home meetings and hotel meetings. I just don't want to do it. I think it's awful. You know, I know these old schoolers and they live on airplanes, you know.

They make a quarter million a year and they spend $150,000 a year on travel, you know, sleeping in cheap hotels building a future that never happens. And I said, I'm not interested in doing it. I'm not interested in wandering around town passing out two DVDs a day. I'm just not interested in doing it.

I'm not going to teach people to do it because I don't think that that's the lifestyle. So I want to teach people how to build a business and have a life. I want to teach people how to build a business and have a life. And I'm going to do it.

So I was looking online and I was looking at businesses and I was talking to my friends but I wasn't actually working. Well here's the interesting thing that I realized after two months. Because of the way that I had built my business, my business was entirely self-sustaining. I mean entirely.

I look back two months later after doing literally nothing and I was like, holy crap, I actually built the dream, right. Because up until that point I had spent two years working and working and working and working and working and working and working, never actually testing is this really a residual income, right. We talk about residual income a lot. But usually you – You have a residual income and you're working a lot.

Well I stopped working and my income was still there. My team was still growing. I wasn't doing anything. Right, they weren't growing fast and people weren't having a lot of success though.

But I was looking at it and I was like, I am doing something special and different, right. I am doing something. And then I started to ask a question, I started to ask a question, I started to ask a question. I said, how can I help people do this because this is special, right.

I am able to create businesses. Now don't get me wrong, I work. But never mistake adding to an empire for maintaining one. It's different, right.

When I work, I work to add, right. When I work, I work to expand. When I work, I work to build. I don't work to do something, to repeat something I did two years ago.

It's just not something I did, right. It's a different model, right. So I work and I work for the future. But in any case, so I'm sitting there and I'm asking this question and asking this question and asking this question and asking this question and asking this question.

There may have been a prayer or two in there, who knows. And I'm saying, how can I help people do this. And then one day I was walking through, you know. Hey Dave.

Now. Huh? I just want to point this out. You kept saying, you keep saying, the question that you're asking was the how can I or how do I question.

It's important, right. It is important because it's like, you know, there's really weird stuff that happens when you focus your mind in a direction and you ask a question, you ask for an answer for something. And like I said, Vic, I don't know how this works. I mean, you're a Christian.

This could be God doing this. I don't know. You know, the New Agers have all these fancy explanations for things. You know, the ether is tapping into other people's unconscious minds and all this stuff.

And then other people are like, well, God's doing it. I don't know how any of this works. What I do know is that if you persist in asking a question, something happens that's a little bit weird if you just persist and persist and persist and just kind of never let up. It's just weird.

Like one time, I'm going to tell you a strange story. This is unrelated and then I'll come back. One time I was trying to find, I'll tell you about this later. I've just never shared this story.

I've got some really strange stories that I tend to leave off of webinars because, you know, my stories are weird enough that I share. But one time I was trying to find an answer to something and it was like a question about, it was like a philosophical question. I can't remember what it was. And I was asking a question and asking a question and asking a question.

I'm one of these guys like, you know, how Einstein, he came up with the theory of relativity because he visualized himself in a light beam for like ten years straight and tried to imagine what would the world be like. And if I was a light beam, you know, who does that? Einstein, right? That's why he's Einstein.

But I'm like one of these guys. So like I was asking some philosophical question and there had been this really strange experience that had happened to me a few years before that I couldn't explain. There was just no physical or emotional explanation for it. I couldn't explain it through hypnosis.

It was a really strange thing that happened to me. So I was asking and asking and asking and asking. I was like, how did this happen? How did this happen?

How did this happen? I just wouldn't stop. I wouldn't let up. Here's what happened.

I kept doing it, kept doing it, kept doing it. And I had never ran into anybody that had had this same experience that I had had. It was really different. I'm not going to share the experience because it's weird.

But anyways, here's what happened. I was a missionary at the time in England, in the Midlands, which is like the most unreligious group of people I think in the world. But I was wandering around hitting people up, talking to people all day. I was thinking about this thing and thinking about this thing and thinking about this thing and thinking about this thing and thinking about this thing.

And then one day I'm sitting there and this person turns around, looks at me and comes up and just starts sharing this crazy story that's exactly like my crazy story for no apparent reason whatsoever. And I just sat there and I kind of went like this and I was like, that was really interesting. And every day, every single day I kid you not, I think it was 45 days straight, straight, I had gone my entire life having this weird thing happen and never had heard anything about it like it. And then for 45 days straight, I would like be on a street corner, some person would just be standing there, turn around, walk up, talk to me and tell me some crazy story that was exactly like my nutty story.

And like that's an example of weird stuff that happens when you persist with your mind in a single direction for some reason. Don't ask me why it happens because I'm not God and I don't know. So anyways, I'm wondering how can I help people do this? How can I help people do this?

How can I help people do this? How can I help people do this? And I'm like one of the most persistent people in the world with everything. And one night I'm kind of like walking through, I had been looking for things online, I had been looking for other businesses that worked the way that I wanted, that maybe I could join.

I was looking for teams that were growing the way that I wanted to grow and I couldn't find anything. I was looking for concepts that would help and I found some good concepts but they were all kind of scattered between different business models. I was looking at my business and I was saying like why is this actually happening? So I was seeing.

I was seeking and I was searching. Well then here's what happened. I was walking through the hills, you know, mad a little bit and then I just kind of let my mind wander a bit and then it was like down at my house near Port Alone, up in the hills listening to I think Holosync or something and I had just this like company download in my brain. It was like and I knew it would work.

And the vision that started the company which was, I want to help people to be able to build a business and have a life at the same time. I want to be able to create something that gives people the ability to actually create what we're selling, right. Because there's always two things going on. I build network marketing.

Those of you who are watching this product, you might be doing something else, right. I do network marketing in a weird kind of way. Well in network marketing there's always two things going on. There's products being sold and there's affiliates who are being recruited, right.

And then once the affiliates are recruited, you're training them to sell products and recruit affiliates, right. There's always these two different dynamics going on. Well I was always this person who was building teams of affiliates who were selling products. That's always kind of what I've done.

And the interesting thing is in this industry, there's just not a lot of success in large numbers and small groups of people in companies like this. There just isn't. I mean if you look out there, I challenge anybody on here to kind of just look out there in the marketplace and try to find something like Empower Network, right. Now this isn't here to sell you our affiliate program.

You guys could build a business. You could build whatever you want to do. And this is just generically applicable, but we really have this weird ability to help people create incomes here. We have a higher percentage of our affiliate base who make money than anywhere that's on the internet or offline.

The checks are bigger from smaller groups of people. People are succeeding who don't really know how it works. Not everybody creates success obviously, but what we're creating is weird and different. Why is it weird and different?

Because the vision that started it was weird and different. So how did I come up with this? I had a desire in my heart that was basically there my whole adult life. My desire was I am going to build a life by lifting other people up financially and personally.

That's just always what I wanted to do ever since I was exposed to it, right. And so the question is number one, what do you really want? What do you really want? And then number two, how can you enhance that to be generationally transformational to where you can think in a way to where it's embracing all the visions of the people around you.

That was like a really long answer to probably a short question. You probably have a bunch more questions, but that was like my kind of two cents on it. No, this is awesome and I'm thinking – like I'm listening to you and I'm picking up a few things. So number one, you said before you can – it started with you being self-centered with what you wanted to accomplish and let me ask you this.

If you were not after… You know, giant houses and big expensive cars or whatever else, what was your personal goal that you wanted to hit? That once you hit it, then it became like no more about you, then it became more about other people. Well, my goal – I was sold on this dream that is generally not lived but it's possible, right. Where you can create a business.

You can create a business that takes on a life of its own and then you can be free from constraints that are created from time and constraints of time and money. Meaning that you can make decisions for yourself not based on economics, not based on the time that you have, but you can make decisions based on really what you want to do. That was the dream that I was sold on in network marketing and I knew some guys, I met some guys that lived that. For me, I wanted to be able to pick up and move wherever I wanted in the world.

If I didn't want to work, I didn't want to have to work. And then I want to… When I worked, it was because I wanted to work so my mind could be free to seek out what it is that I'm really here to do. Because I believe that – and this is why we're talking about needs being met. Because I believe that – this is what I can liken it to the best.

The best, okay, is a drowning man. If you think about like the Justin Varengia story is a great story because not only is it a story but it's also an archetype. Because if you're underwater and you can't breathe, right. What do you think about?

Air. Right? You're not thinking about food, you're not thinking about sex, you're not thinking about having babies, you're not thinking about your family, you're thinking about air. Right?

Air. And in society, the best way I could liken it is society is – I don't know if this is purposeful. I'm not a person that's going to sit here and talk negative and say somebody is planning this. Well, maybe they are.

I don't know. I don't know. It's very frustrating. It's just the way society is constructed in a way that kind of keeps people under the water to where all they can think about is getting that next check, going to work and following the system of society, right?

So it's really difficult in society to pursue your dreams unless you're really persistent. This is just generally, right. We're not saying it can't happen. It's just generally, right.

Society doesn't really encourage you to pursue your dreams. People tend to give up on them. People say, oh, that's wishful thinking and they say things like this. The reality is though if you think about society.

Society is like this thing where it's like you're always under water, all you can think about is Friday and then you get to Friday, you look at your paycheck, you're discouraged and you go and you pay your bills, there's barely anything left and all you can think about is going to work and then coming home and you barely have time for your family and it's like you're running on this treadmill. For me I wanted to get off the treadmill because my mind was just consumed all the time. I was poor most of my adult life Vic, I was always in a place where it was like trying to pay my rent and I remember I moved to Phoenix, Arizona after my mission and I got a sales job for ADT, selling alarm systems and I couldn't pay my rent.

I remember I was 15 days late on my rent one month and almost got evicted because I couldn't sell. If you can imagine the time in my life when I couldn't sell, I just couldn't get people to buy those things. I was going door to door all day and night. I just couldn't make money and I just at the nick of time, the last possible second made enough money to pay my rent and that was kind of how my adult life went for a good five or six years.

I wanted to get out of that to where my mind was free. The interesting thing was when my mind was free, that was my desire. I wanted to be able to go and sink my toes in the hot sand in a beach somewhere, drinking out of coconuts, not worrying about where the money is going to come from to do the things that I wanted to do. I wanted to be able to pick up on a plane and travel to Bora Bora and put my toes out over a bungalow, looking out over the moon, hanging out over the ocean and to be able to just be there because I wanted to be there.

I wanted to be able to, if I wanted to, write a book, which funny enough I haven't wanted to write a book so far but I might write one this year. I wanted to be able to write a book if I wanted to and I wanted to be able to pursue what was inside. I've never been in a place to do it. When I was in high school, I had to think about high school.

When I was in kindergarten, I had to think about kindergarten. When I was a missionary, I had to think about being a missionary. When I got back from that, I had to think about my job. I was never free.

So I wanted to get free and I got free and that was my goal. Once I got free, my mind just started to wander and sometimes people say, Dave, you're a little crazy. Well, it's like you're free to pursue your wants, your wishes and your desires for a few years and you start being a little different. You might be different in a way that people don't think you're a little nuts.

Like I am. But you start to be a little bit different and have different ideas because you think about different things when you're free. That was my goal. Does that make sense?

This is so awesome, Dave. Here's the thing. So you just said something that totally I can see myself in that as well. That it starts with you starting to dream big about what you really want.

That might not be like the tangible, the exotic car or whatever the thing is, but you had these crazy ideas. Of traveling the world, sinking your toes into the hot sand and flying anywhere you want without just having this freedom. Which essentially, man, essentially this is what everybody on like subconscious deep down does what everybody wants to do. I remember I was just in – and I want to ask you man, what made – I'm the how guy.

Okay. What made you able to get to the point to where you believed that it was possible for you? So if you can think about that. I was just in Miami.

I just got back from Miami yesterday, last night. I was standing in front of – I was on the beach and standing in front of three Trump Towers, Donald Trump Towers in Sunny Isles. I was looking at – it was like 5, 6 o'clock in the evening and my wife and I were just on the beach. I'm like – I told her.

I'm like, baby, look. There are three Trump Towers. Each of those buildings, I don't know, hundreds of millions of dollars. And when you think about it, there is one owner.

And when I look at that, I go if it's possible for somebody to create what they envisioned, right? It's definitely totally possible. It's totally possible for me to take my business where I want to go in this marketing arena. I remember when I was getting started, I really started out of being dissatisfied with the life that I had.

And I think, guys, I think creating a vision for yourself is going to start with you being dissatisfied with where you are right now. A lot of people are – they're kind of – they're getting comfortable with being mediocre. You know? They're getting comfortable with having just enough.

And I think if you are comfortable with having just enough in your life, I think that's going to prevent you from being inspirational visionary. I just think – this is just me thinking out loud. Because what's opposite of extraordinary, right? What's opposite of great?

Well, it's not being just bad or anything or like the totally polar opposite. Really, what's opposite of being great is being average. You know? So a lot of people, a lot of marketers, they have average standards in their lives.

I remember when I was getting started in this industry, I was looking at people who were extraordinary, who had extraordinary results in their lives and in their businesses. And I was not – I was just dissatisfied. We lived in a one-bedroom apartment. And one thing that I would do.

And this is where my vision kind of started from. It kind of stemmed from that place is I would literally get in the car and I would drive to the richest neighborhoods in our city, right? And I would just drive around, do nothing but just drive around in those areas. And I would just envision myself one day.

I did not know how. I did not know when it was going to happen, right? But I was just being in that place and that environment. As often, as frequent as I possibly could, that sparked a vision for myself and my family.

And I just started to believe that one day it's going to be us, right? One day I will be able to provide that for my family. And one thing that I was doing constantly, deliberately, and I'm not sure if you did that as well for yourself, but I constantly wanted to… I'm going to have terrible laughter, but I'm not sure.

Oh, yeah, you're getting an echo. Let me mute myself out while you're talking here. Yeah. I'm actually curious if this is, you know, if you were in a similar situation or not.

But one thing, guys, I'm going to share this with you. One thing that helped me keep my vision, right? It's always going to start with you, okay? You cannot help somebody.

You cannot, you know, transfer your vision. You cannot inspire somebody else. You cannot get inspired with your vision unless you get inspired with your vision and unless you actually do something about it and unless you can nurture, you can figure out how to nurture your vision until it manifests. And for me, that was constantly listening and being around people and watching people who supported my vision.

You know, there's a lot of, you know, dream stealers. There's a lot of people who will tell you you cannot do it. There's a lot of media. There's a lot of, you know, garbage that's out there that's around you.

And it's being able to tune in. It's a channel that you want to listen to, right, without being swayed to the left or to the right and keeping that channel open and kind of channeling your energy and consciously, you know, focusing on that until you start to believe that it's, you know what, there is no other way. You know, there is no other way. And I remember when that happened to me, you know, as I was driving through.

These neighborhoods, I was listening to people like Bob Proctor and, you know, he was constantly, you know, speaking in my car, right? I was listening to these CDs. And it's over and over again. Hey, it's possible for somebody else if, you know, Edison had 10,000 failures and, you know, and then he, you know, he created what he was after.

If Wright Brothers were dreaming of a flying machine and they never gave up and then it manifested for them. And somehow, something happened. Something shifted inside of my mind. That I started to believe that, you know, it's going to happen for me personally.

And then, Dave, like you're saying, man, magic happens, man. It's, you know, you come across people who will help you on your journey. What was that for you? What kept your dream alive, Dave, when you were failing?

Just curious. Because I know it didn't just all of a sudden happen. Well, I mean, I haven't really talked about this a lot. But there was a handful of things.

You know, the first three years, well, the first year about, it was enthusiasm, right? But I failed for seven years. It was a long time. And, you know, my first year, it was enthusiasm.

After that, it was, I had a couple of people around in me that believed in me. And that had done things that I had never been able to do. One of them was a guy named Dennis Osterdach. He's still alive.

He's still in Amway, actually. He's a, I think he's still an Emerald. He was an Emerald, which means he's helped like three people make, you know, 60,000 a year or something like that. But, you know, he would look me right in the eye, kind of pull me in close and say, David, I know that you are going to be great in this industry.

And the authenticity of the way he said that and the feeling I had when he said it, I could never thank a person enough for that because it made me, I couldn't believe in myself because I had had so much failure, you know, after a time. But I could believe somebody else. And that's what kept it alive. And then there's another, a couple more guys, David Shores, you know, Amway folks.

And honestly, I'm going to be truthful. Those guys were the best people I've ever met at that. Aside from some people at Empower Network that have, you know, and some other organizations that have sprang from it, I've never met people like that before. Not in network marketing.

Normally network marketing is people kind of running around ragged, passing out DVDs and doing three-way calls to recruit as many people as possible. Those Amway folks are really good at kind of lifting people up from the inside. And it's evidenced by what they do. You know, they've packed rooms of 15,000 people where almost nobody in the room has earned any money ever, you know.

They just kind of stick around because they like being a part of it. And, you know, they believed in me. And so, you know, after I quit that company and I joined another company, I always held on to that I can do it. And then after a while, I started to meet lots of people to where, you know, I'd been around for a while and I looked at these people and I said, you know, they're really not more talented than I am.

And then, you know, I started to have little successes. I could recruit people, you know, here and there. And then I started to be able to recruit people consistently offline. And I believed if I could recruit a couple of people a month, which I learned to do, that I believed I could build a big organization one day.

So I just kind of stuck around. And then here's what really happened. And this, guys, this was a radical shift, okay. And this is when it went from believing enough to stay around to knowing it was going to happen.

And that's totally different. And this goes back. I'm going to go back in time a little bit to something I learned, again, from these Amway cats. And a lot of them, they come from, you know, a lot of those guys, the bigger leaders there, they're like, they're like come from Christian backgrounds and stuff.

And I just like taking knowledge from wherever I can get it. But one thing Bill Britt was always talking about was he was talking, there's this book I read in Amway and it's a really short read. It's a really tiny book, but it's called Hung by the Tongue. You ever read that book, Vic?

No. Hung by the Tongue? No. No.

No. No. No. No.

No. No. No. No.

No. No. No. No.

No. No. No. No.

No. No. No. No.

No. No. No. No.

No. I heard about it, but I didn't read it. Hung by the Tongue, yeah. And basically, the book talks about how you're hung by the words of your mouth, right?

Which I think is a quote from somewhere in the Bible, right? Where like in the New Testament, you've got James who's talking about how, you know, your words are like a rudder on a ship that steers a ship, right? And a tiny little piece of a ship that's this big can turn something that's thousands of pounds. You know what I mean?

And your words are like that in your life. And if you get around people who are poverty-minded, what are they always doing? They're always complaining. They're always talking.

You can essentially… Bill Britt used to say they're speaking their life into existence. They're speaking poverty over their life. I don't know if that comes from a Christian background or where that comes from.

This is how he talked. But I read that book, Hung by the Tongue. And you know, I never forgot that, those things that he said, because it was just weird things to say. People talk like that.

Hey, the way that you talk creates a life, right? The way that you talk out loud, the way the things that you say to people will control your life. And they will. And I've learned this just by watching people, that the way people talk around themselves to their friends, their family, they create it everywhere.

And it's actually unbelievable to watch people do this because it's so consistent. Here's the magic that started happening, and it was when I got online. Okay. When I got online, I came in in a way, I joined a business in a way where I knew I could replicate it.

So I knew I could replicate that. I didn't know, I did not know the ease of which I was going to be able to do it once I kind of got the knack of it and knew what I was doing, but I knew I could replicate it. But here's the magic, is I started gathering groups together of people and I started talking about my dreams publicly in front of people and what I was going to create literally every day. And when I was on the phone with people, people would hit me up in email, because I just did whatever it took when I got online, I'd get on the phone with people, I'd be talking about my dreams, I'd be talking about what we're going to do together, I'd be talking about the future.

I started talking about the vision. And it was like as I talked about it, as I spoke about it, it painted it more clearly. And I started talking about it and I think it was a result of what I was saying out loud all the time. It forced a mental picture to be clear.

It was a result of what I was saying out loud all the time, forced a mental picture to be so clear of the future that I just, it wasn't like I was going to step into it, it was like it was already there because I was painting it with my words into my life. And you know it's really interesting, I got online Vic and I said I am going to make $30,000 a month within 90 days and I'm going to move down to Costa Rica and live on the beach. And I would get on a webinar and then I'd go through doing a presentation and then I'd start talking about how I'm going to go live in Costa Rica.

I didn't do that within 90 days, but within 90 days I hit the income that drove that. It took me three months, Vic. And it was because what happened was, I talk about this a lot, where you start talking about a vision, not everybody buys into it. Some people just think you're full of poo, right.

A lot of people who heard Martin Luther King going from town to town just thought he was full of poo, didn't they. They're like oh yeah, that's going to ever happen. However. He kept talking about it and the crowds start to grow, that's what happens.

And some people do buy into it and I just kept talking about it and talking about it and talking about it and I think that what I said convinced me. Because every time I was selling somebody else on my vision and where I was going, it was changing something on the inside for me and that's when things really change. And that's why I believe when people start to do live stuff, Vic, they transform. And I've seen this really consistently by the way.

I don't know anybody who has anything more than a very small amount of success that does not do live stuff. I just don't know anyone. If you look at everyone in Empowered, I know a lot of people in and out of Empowered. I mean we're not talking about hotel meetings, although maybe that's what they do.

We're talking about people who just have success. Who do you know in your team that doesn't do live stuff, who's having not just some success. We're not talking about $2000 a month or $3000 a month and then going up and down with their income. We're talking about consistently making $30,000 and $40,000 a month.

Who isn't a player. Who isn't a part of something live going on consistently. Who do you know? Anyone?

You have to. There's no one. You have to. And I think part of the mechanism behind that, Vic, is that when you're talking about, I can't explain all this, I just know this is the way it is.

For some reason when you are talking about your dreams, when you're speaking about your vision, when you're talking about it, whether it's because it paints the picture more clear in your own mind and that's what does it, it causes your automatic seeking mechanism to kind of start aiming you. Towards that goal. Or whether it's because there's some sort of supernatural phenomenon behind it. Or whether it's because the words that you speak kind of govern and control your unconscious mechanisms which is why they do.

I could talk about why for an hour, I don't want to get into that. But they do. Your words absolutely control your unconscious mechanisms. And a lot of people, they don't pay attention to things that they say.

But this is the way that, language is a really interesting thing, Vic, and I'm fascinated by language. I'm learning Spanish right now. I'm like, you know. I can now say fluently anything I want in Spanish but usually using the wrong words, right?

So I'm like all over the place with my words. Like a child, you know. They describe all around what they want. But I'm starting to be able to like think in Spanish and I dream in Spanish and you know, things like this because I'm speaking Spanish all night and then I'm speaking Spanish with the kids and then I have a Spanish speaker who comes over every day, right?

Well, something really interesting is that with twins, there's been a lot of studies on this. When twins are born. Uh. They, often times, they develop a system of communication completely unconsciously that mirrors an entire language before they can speak.

Right? Just if you want to do some interesting reading, look that up online. And there's been a lot of theories into why that happens but I believe it's because there's some really interesting studies done into language and that language is a, what's called a surface structure of a deep environment. Right?

Yeah. It's a super structure that's actually built into your brain. In other words, the way that we communicate is built into the brain. There might be some variations in it but if you look at every language in the world, people speak in the same way.

For example, in English you have because. Right? Well, because is a word that's replicated in every language in the world because your mind and your beliefs operate on a because belief. So when you believe something, you believe something because.

Right? I can succeed because this guy succeeded. Right? The sun is going to rise tomorrow because it rose yesterday.

Right? Beliefs operate on because statements regardless of whether it's with words because because is built into the brain. You know, in English you have because. In Spanish you have porque.

Right? You know, in English you have but which is negation. You know, hey Vic, I love you but you smell funny. Right?

. . . Right?

It negates whatever happens before it. Well, that phrase is built into the brain. In English you have but. In Spanish you have pero.

Right? In Russian you have something else. So twins will develop unconscious systems of communication just with their bodies that actually will mirror an entire language because language is a surface structure, a deeper structure that is actually built and hardwired for some reason into the human mind. Right?

That's why all languages in the world that communicate essentially the same way they might change the verb order. Right? like that but fundamentally they're communicating the same things and the same ideas using different words that somebody else came up with because it's hardwired into the brain. So when you're speaking and when you're talking, you're actually, what your words are doing is they are affecting, whether you're aware of it or not, they are affecting the deep structures in the brain which are entirely unconscious mechanisms.

So if you're constantly talking about your vision and you're speaking about your dreams and you're talking about how motivated you are and you're talking about how people around you are going to have success and you're speaking about the vision that you're going to create, what happens is at least from an unconscious mind perspective, you are putting all of the internal mechanisms that you need inside your mind to work, to aim you into the direction that you want. I just actually finished re-reading Psycho-Cybernetics, which is a great book by the way.

And I have read that book like I think five or ten times and you know that book, he talks about you have an automated goal seeking mechanism that's built into your mind. And essentially what that is, is it's that most of the behavior that you have is unconscious, most of it. You know if you think about the things that you do, did you mean to put your hand there on your face Vic or did you just kind of do it? You know what I mean?

Did you mean to blink just now or did you just kind of do it? Are you controlling your breathing or are you just breathing? Are you paying attention to where your feet are or are they just doing what they're doing? Most of our behavior is unconscious and when your unconscious mind is aimed in the direction of your vision, all of these little things that there's no way we could ever be aware of are going to work in our favor to get us towards the direction that we want to go in some way.

And I don't know what all the mechanisms are but I do know your unconscious mind is doing a lot of it. And so that's like a little bit on why I believe and why I'm saying that, whether it's the Bible and whether God's doing it. But it's really interesting that spiritual beliefs tend to all teach the same things in regards to that. If you go into the Old Testament or the New Testament or Buddhist teachings, you'll never find a spiritual teacher.

That has some like massive, massive following that says, by the way, speak negative all the time because that's going to get you what you want. You're just not going to find one, right? Because they know. Right?

They know. So that's like a little two cents and some tidbits for people. I think that's actually really useful information. This is not just a little bit of useful information.

What you're sharing here, man, this right here is – guys, I hope you pay attention. There's a couple of things, Dave. There's a couple of things that you said that I want to point out. Let me ask you this.

How long have you been studying Spanish for now? Spanish? Well, I started a little bit studying Spanish about a year ago. And then I started – however, I'd say 95% of my Spanish I've learned in the last four months.

Okay. Now check this out. You did this, I bet, because you immersed yourself in that environment. You got yourself a teacher.

Your wife is – you talk with her in Spanish, kids, everything, you're around Spanish people. The environment is so important, right? So what would happen if you just learned – we're just taking a lesson in Spanish every two weeks and then the rest of the time you were out of that environment, right? So guys, I hope you're paying attention.

So as you – if you're building your vision, okay, it's very, very important to put yourself in the environment that's going to be supportive to your vision. It applies to everything. It applies to language. It applies to whatever, okay, whatever else that's out there.

Second thing is, Dave, you're talking about deliberately seeking out and deliberately paying attention to the language that you're using, okay? So when you speak to yourself and even when you think to yourself, there is a language of failure and there is a language of success. There is a language of a visionary. There is a language of a leader.

There is a language of a mediocre person. There is a language of, you know, a person, a poor person. There are certain language patterns that, you know, when we speak it, when we think of it, it's going to dictate, right, where you're going. So there's a couple of things that I just wanted to point out.

Very, very important, guys. Very important. See, when you're – what you're doing here is you're literally – you're literally creating yourself into a persona that you're just a force. You know, here's the thing, when it comes to business, Dave, I don't know if you agree with me.

I'm curious about, you know, to hear your thoughts on this. I think there's three things that we need to think of. If you can think of yourself, okay, when you think of yourself as a visionary, okay, here is something that I would recommend, okay? Number one, when I think of myself as a visionary, okay, I want to be sharp, man.

I want to be on the top of my game. I want to know what I'm talking about. I want to know my vision. I want to know what I want to achieve, right?

So you've got to be very, very sharp. Number two is enthusiasm, okay? If you lack enthusiasm, if you have a vision but you lack an enthusiasm, that is – there is no congruency, okay? And number three is when you think of yourself, when you have all those, you know, things in place, you've literally become a force to be reckoned with, okay?

And when you have these three things, you're sharp, you're enthusiastic, and you are a force of nature. You are a force. You are a force to be reckoned with, right? You literally create this aura around yourself as a marketer to where people can't help them – can't help themselves but they want to be around you, right?

They want to be a part of what you're doing because they just feel a sense of, you know, you being different. You know, you're not like everybody else. And when you talk about your vision, what are your thoughts about that, man? Well, you know, I – it's really interesting that when I started to have success online, this was a statement.

There's a gal and I don't know what she's up to now, this is actually a fake name because she worked in Hollywood. Her name was Amy Jo Neal and she was a friend of mine. She was, you know, part of one of my organizations and we were good friends and I saw her at all the events. And what she said to me, you know, is she said, you know, it's really interesting being around you because she's around – she worked for at the time HBO I believe in their casting department and she just knew a lot of famous actors.

And to be a famous actor, you have to have a dream. You just do. And because that's hard, you know what I mean, there's only a few of them that could be there and you got to really, really, really be persistent, right? And there's actually a story of Jim Carrey where, you know, he – a lot of people they just see him and they're like, gosh, he gets paid $30 million for a movie or whatever and, you know, but there's a guy that has acted every role imaginable and done well.

But he actually like wrote himself a big book. Yeah. A big check, right? And it was for this amount he visualized himself getting for one movie and he visualized that check while he was failing, while he was getting rejected, while he, you know, getting roles for like ten years, right?

And I think it was Ace Ventura Pet Detective that finally paid him that amount for being in a movie, you know? And that was like year after years of just like brutalness, brutality, right? But he had a dream. He just persisted in the dream.

Well, you know, Amy Joneal, she came up to me and she said, it's really interesting being around you because you have that energy and that presence that like a really good actor has, you know, where they walk in a room and people just kind of start paying attention to you. And I believe that because dreaming is so unique, it just is. In the world today, dreaming is unique. The world is full of people that are dying on the inside because the system we've been fed.

It doesn't work for everybody. It doesn't work for people even when they persist in it. You know, I like to think about it like this, when you look at society, it's like sometimes people are like, oh 90 something percent of people in this industry fail and it's like, well look at society. You know, in society, you know, it's like by the time you're age 65, 98% of the population is dead, broke or on social security.

Meaning that if they – meaning that they are not – they do not have an income sufficient, you know, to pay for their mortgage and the things in their house and the things around them and you find all sorts of senior citizens out there working odd jobs at Wal-Mart and things like that because – but here's the thing, that takes 40 years to figure out it doesn't work. You know what I mean? Forty years. You know, at least in what we do, if it doesn't work, somebody just quits in a year or they quit in six months.

You know what I mean? It doesn't take 40 if they don't want to succeed. They just leave. You know what I'm saying?

They can just go do something else for a living, right? But I believe because persistence is so important. You know what I'm saying? Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And dreaming is so unique that when somebody dreams for a long period of time, there's something weird that happens to them.

Like when I get around you, Vic, you've got a presence about you and it's a really unique presence that you have and it's because you do different things than people do. It's because you read every day. It's because you wake up early and you stay up late if you need to. It's because you work hard and you're constantly aiming your mind in a direction that doesn't exist yet.

You know what I mean? It's like some people, they just kind of – they're like – It's because you – It's because you – they just let life carry them where life carries them and you're the kind of person that's making a path for a river to flow down. But you have to see that road looking into a jungle. And when you do that for a long period of time, it changes you.

And I'm going to be honest Vic, a lot of these things that I observe, I observe the effects of them and I don't know how they work. I just know that it's very consistent that it does work in a certain way and people get – like look at Justin Barangia. I'll tell you that man has a presence doesn't he? He comes in that video, in that new sales video I made, he comes out there and he's just sharing about the four things that why he believes everybody should be wealthy and giving a testimonial.

He's coming across like a movie star, isn't he? He didn't like that when I met him, he was not like that when I met him. But he was a dreamer who had been beaten down a lot and as soon as he got into an environment where his dreams could become real and he could succeed the way that he always wanted to succeed, the magic came out of that man, the magic came out. And everybody on this call, it's not about being a movie star, it's about what kind of magic is kind of stifled on the inside.

What is it for you? For me, it's like I've always had this ability to get in front of people and to capture their attention at least. I was always good at that. I was never really good at selling.

For me, I was always good at selling. I was always good at selling. I was never really good at selling. For me, I've been good at selling for most of my life.

But always, always worked and it worked and it worked. I was really great at getting and keeping attention all my life and being in front of people. I had this charisma and people would pay attention. But I just had nothing to say when I was younger because I wasn't reading anything useful, because I wasn't listening to anything useful.

You know what I mean? So what I was saying didn't have any wisdom to it, right? I hadn't gone through the school of hard knocks, but what I persisted in my vision and I listened to audios for ten years and, you know, I laced I read books and I studied and I modeled successful people and when I started to do that, all of a sudden when I would open my mouth, what I started to say became useful to people. They started to want to have more and that's when everything changes.

Everything changes because if you think about what's really on the inside, this is a useful exercise is just if you could imagine the archetype of the person that you really want to be. Who do you really want to be? The best you, you know what I mean? Not that it has these anxiety things and stuff like this, but the best you.

The you that can stand on a stage and be cool and confident and calm. The you that can pick up the phone and close every sale if that's what you want. The you that can get on a webinar. The you that can get on a webinar.

The you that can get on a webinar and be asked questions and just talk and everything that you say is valuable. The you that has wisdom. What's that you look like from the inside? You can step into that image and be who you want to be if you persist in your dreams.

And I would encourage you to dream bigger. I always keep a notebook around. Number one, I take notes and I jot thoughts down, but also every day I'll jot down stuff that I want as I'm thinking of it. The interesting thing is I've done this.

I've done that for years. But I go back sometimes to these old notebooks and I go through just pages of stuff that I jotted down once and never really thought of again, but just is in my life now. You know what I mean? And it's really interesting how when you aim your mind in a direction, your mind just kind of will take over for you.

It'll just take over for you. And that's what I really want you guys to understand is that right now, a lot of you are unconsciously sabotaging yourself. And it's a result of what you're doing consciously because your unconscious mind isn't some undirected mechanism. You're directing it.

Absolutely you're directing it by the things that you're feeding into your mind, by the words that you're speaking out of your mouth, by the actions you're either deciding to take or to not take, by the people you're associating yourself around. You know, all through your body, there's a type of nerve cell called mirroring neurons. And this is actually proven. If you're a golfer and you watch golf, it will automatically fire off the mirroring neurons in your body and you will become better at golf just from watching.

By doing nothing more. Even if you're not consciously trying to be better at golf by watching it. When you get around people like this who are creating extraordinary results, who are creating extraordinary followings and you listen and you allow yourself to be absorbed, right, like you would with a language, immersion into a new environment, it kind of causes like a rebirth from the inside and you just start automatically modeling these behaviors. Like some of the smartest people I see on Facebook, you know Aaron Rashkin, you know, Aaron Rashkin.

He has a lot of good things to say and I love this guy, I've known him for years. And you know, he goes to sleep with an audio and sometimes he'll wake up after the audio is done, flip it to another audio and go back to sleep. Bill Britt used to do that, you know. And I flipped on Facebook a little bit ago and he says, you know, I've re-listened the call from last night four times today, right.

Well that's a guy who's done 10 million dollars in sales. Well what are the people that are complaining doing? Nothing. They're not doing what Aaron Rashkin is doing, they're not doing what Vic is doing, they're definitely doing what Aaron Rashkin is doing.

They don't have a book right there on their desk that they're reading. I'm actually re-reading this book, Influence, right, you know, and it's right on my desk. Why? Because I force myself to read every day for a set period of time, right.

And leaders are readers, just unquestionably, right. If you read every day. Speaking of the book, I actually got a book laying on my desk right now, we've all been reading a little bit today too. Yeah, yeah.

It's interesting man, isn't it? It's interesting. Yeah. People talk about wanting to be successful, but if you talk to them about, you know, you just put them in a corner and you say, hey look, what would your average perfect day look like?

If you could have, if you could live your life any way you want, what would that look like? And you know what, 99% of people would not tell you right away, they'd have to think about it. You know, like from the time when you wake up in the morning, from the, you know, where do you go to lunch, like if you can imagine your perfect average day, why not, guys, here's your homework for tonight, okay. If you, if you will do this, okay, not everybody's going to do this and that's okay with me, right.

You're not doing this for me, you're doing this for yourself. Grab a sheet of paper, okay, grab a pen, write out your perfect average day. If you could have this magical ability to create your perfect average day that you, and don't, don't, you know, keep in mind that whatever you created, you would have to live with it for the rest of your life, okay. What would it look like for you?

Really think about it, you know, it may take you a day to figure this out, it may take you two days, it may take you a week to really, really get crystal clear, but here's what's going to happen. When you do that and when you get crystal clear on this for yourself, right, it'll be, I promise you, it'll be so much easier for you to talk about your vision to other people because people don't buy your products. People buy your vision and what your, and products is just, it just, you know, means to an end, you know. We just happen to have.

I believe the best products that, you know, some of the best products in this industry through Empower Network, you know, stuff that's coming out, you know. Somebody wants to learn traffic, somebody wants to learn how to, you know, how to become better speakers. There is the inner circle, there is the, you know, the blog, there is the 15K formula and by the way, if you don't own 15K formula, guys, get it, alright. You want to be a student of the product, you want to be a, you know, a product of the product.

You know, the products are there for you, but people will buy into your vision when you talk about your products. Talk about your business when you are sending out emails. If you have this magnetism to yourself, it will be easier for you. But you don't have that if you are not clear on exactly what you want.

So your homework is this, folks. Take as much time as you want, okay, as you need and really get crystal clear on your vision, okay. If somebody wakes you up at 3 o'clock in the morning and says, hey, what's your perfect average day is going to, you know, looks like, you'll be able to tell them just like that, you know. Dave.

I think what you shared, brother, is just valuable. There's tons and tons of gold in what you shared tonight. And you know, as I look back on my, you know, how I build my business is I just, I don't talk about the nitty-gritty, you know, the compensation plan, what the product is and what it does. I talk about the vision.

I talk about the bigger picture. I was just in Miami and I was interviewing some people, you know, for my team. And there was one guy who started, English is not even his first language. He can barely speak English.

And he is building Empower Network business in Mexico, I believe, in Hispanic market. And so, you know, he earned like $16,000. And guys, again, throwing out some income, you know, claims here. This is not guaranteed, you know.

It doesn't mean that you're going to earn $16,000 if you go market to Spanish people. His experience. And his secret to success was, when I asked him, he says he started with 60 opt-ins, okay, 60 opt-ins. And he was able to build from that and, you know, he won the contest that we had and earned like $16,000 in a month and qualified to be, you know, with us on the yacht in Miami, right.

And when I asked him, how did you do that, he said, he just talks about the vision. He just talks about the big picture. He talks about where he is going. And he talks about what he is going to do with the team.

And he's talking about the big things that they're going to do as a team together, okay. So as you're building your business, it's very important to include other people in your vision, okay. Don't sell products. Sell your vision.

Guys, we've been going on here for about 90 minutes here. I appreciate you all. What we're going to do is, as you're going through these lessons, okay, actually I just decided to do this. Okay.

I'm going to do this tonight for you all. Write your questions down because I know there's a lot of information, there's a lot of ideas being thrown around and it's very easy to kind of, you know, to forget some things and it's very easy, you know, a lot of times when we listen to something, we may have a question pop up and then we forget about it. Guys, as you're watching these, as you're going through these, okay, write your questions down, okay, and then we're going to have a bonus webinar I'm going to do and I'm going to just do nothing but answer all your questions, okay.

So you'll be able to submit your questions about anything. Anything we covered in this product and then the last bonus webinar is going to be just basically answering your questions. So if you have questions, write them down and we'll do that at the end. Cool.

Dave, I just want to say I appreciate you, man. Thank you for taking it. I know you have a little baby. How's he doing, by the way?

Oh, he's doing really great. He's really tranquil. He sure can scream though if he's hungry or something, holy cow, you know, but I'm sleeping less than I think he is. I think I've ever slept for a long time and it's all an interesting learning experience for me.

So, you know, he's doing awesome, man. He's just a cute kid and, I mean, you know what that's like. There's a lot of fathers on here and moms and stuff like that. They're just a unique feeling you get around your kids, you know, and I've never had that.

I've never been a father. So to me, it's like new, you know, and it's so cool to, you know. All these years I've had a lot of love in my life, I've had a lot of people that I love, I've had a lot of people that love me, but that kind of love is special and it's unique. So I've just kind of got this, I'm in this different space in my life, man, you know, where I'm thinking about just how can we leave the world a better place for the future, you know, and it's cool.

I'm enjoying it. So I know you've got a little one too, you know. A girl, right? You've got a little girl.

I've got a little girl. I made a bunch of boys in my life. You made a bunch of boys and a little girl. So four boys and a girl, right?

Yep. Well, special, man. She's a cutie. Thank you.

Yeah, she's awesome. I've been blessed with that. Guys, I appreciate you. You know, start dreaming big.

Don't settle for being mediocre. Don't settle for just getting by. Go after lofty goals, right? Set yourself lofty.

And even if you don't reach that, you'll still be okay, you know what I mean? But just get around people. People who are big dreamers and big thinkers. And don't even pay attention to anybody who is mediocre.

Don't even pay attention to anybody who is not, you know, who's going to tell you you cannot do something. Just ignore them completely. You know, don't give them any of your energy. Surround yourself with people who are going in the direction you want to go.

Guys, we're going to wrap this up for tonight. Look forward to seeing you again tomorrow. And tomorrow we're going to talk about influence, all right, really cool stuff and building trust, you know, in your marketing. See you tomorrow.

We're going to switch back to marketing starting tomorrow. So I've got some really cool ideas for you that I'm going to be sharing tomorrow. So until then, guys, have a fantastic night or day, wherever you are in the world. I appreciate you all.

Dave Wood, I appreciate you, brother. Let's have fun. See you guys next time. Folks, obviously the income examples discussed are extraordinary.

The income claims presented are not intended to serve as a guarantee of income. Instead, they're designed to give you an idea of what's possible. Success in this business requires leadership, hard work, and dedication. I'm Dave Wood.

And I'm Cesar Baird. Thanks for joining us.